


On Tiptoe Stealing

by Emiline



Category: The Worst Witch (TV 2017)
Genre: A little bit of chaos, A touch of Gwen/Algernon, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Humor, Sleepy Cuddles, a bit of anxiety for poor Maud, half Genfic and half Hackle, trying to get a straight answer out of the trio is like herding cats
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-13 07:05:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16887900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emiline/pseuds/Emiline
Summary: It had seemed like such a reasonable plan when Mildred first proposed it. Well, that was not precisely true, it had in fact seemed like a plan with some fairly significant holes in it, but it had seemed about forty percent reasonable, which as Mildred’s plans went, was not too bad.In which Mildred's plan goes awry, and Miss Cackle and Miss Bat try to sort the matter out.





	On Tiptoe Stealing

**Author's Note:**

> This incorporates the prompts: lights, gifts, and stars.
> 
> Title comes from _The Pirates of Penzance_ (Gilbert and Sullivan)
> 
> (As always, not my characters & no money made, I've merely borrowed them for a silly romp.)

_We really, really, should not be here,_ thought Maud. It had seemed like such a reasonable plan when Mildred first proposed it. Well, that was not precisely true, it had in fact seemed like a plan with some fairly significant holes in it, but it had seemed about forty percent reasonable, which as Mildred’s plans went, was not too bad. It was also remarkably difficult to muster one’s arguments for common sense or even remember in the face of Mildred’s serene and genuine faith in the efficacy of her plans, a calm assurance that she persisted in no matter how wild and unlikely the idea. Now however, creeping through Miss Hardbroom’s sitting room, terrified that the smallest noise they made would alert their teacher to their decidedly illicit presence, the plan seemed only about five percent reasonable.

If one could ignore one’s terror, the room was itself surprisingly cozy. Bathed in the soft glow of perpetually flickering tea candles, it looked almost welcoming, if one ignored the shadows that lurked in the corners. Out of the corner of her eye Maud saw something flash and looked up to the ceiling, which to her astonishment was covered in dozens of tiny, glittering, silver stars. 

At first, she could only gape in wonder. It was surpassingly lovely–the backdrop a midnight blue, the stars twinkling. Then she saw that the blue was not uniform, but full of a variety of shades, lending depth and movement, as though clouds were passing over and behind a beautiful, living tapestry. It was a remarkable piece of magic-work, and one that Maud knew could not have been achieved without considerable outlay of effort, patience, skill, and time. Grandma Mona had done something in this general style for Maud’s parents’ wedding, and hadn’t Maud heard a hundred times of how Grandma Mona had carefully worked for weeks to create the one for her parents’ wedding reception.

This – this was beautiful and unexpected and she did not know where to fit in the information in her understanding of Miss Hardbroom, that Miss Hardbroom was a person who had her ceiling strewn with stars. 

Mildred’s frantic tug on her arm drew her attention back to the present. 

_Come on!_ , Mildred mouthed. 

Maud shook her head and pointed up. Mildred’s jaw dropped. “Wow,” she whispered, only her voice cracked and the word finished in a squeak, appallingly loud in the utter quiet of the night. Maud clapped a hand over Mildred’s mouth. A sort of shocked wonder bloomed on Enid’s face as she turned her gaze upwards to see what all the fuss was about. When finally she brought her focus back down to the other two, Maud could see her struggling not give voice to her surprise, her thoughts flitting across her face as clearly as if she had spoken them.

They remained stock still, scarcely daring to breathe. Thirty seconds passed, then a minute. Though she strained her ears with all her might the only noise Maud could hear were her and her friends’ ragged breaths. When another minute had passed and there was no sign of an irate potions mistress, they all three of them heaved a sigh of relief.

 _That was close_ , Enid mouthed, and Maud and Mildred nodded vigorously.

A lamp flicked on.

“I’m sure one of you would like to explain to me what is no doubt an excellent reason as to why the three of you are skulking around Miss Hardbroom’s rooms in the dead of night?”

Maud yelped, leaping into the air and tripping slightly on her landing, toppling into the loveseat.

“Miss Cackle!” she heard Mildred stammer. “You–We–that is–but–what are you doing here?” Mildred finally blurted out, and Maud, who had been in the process of pushing herself back up buried her face into the cushion. Maybe if she wished hard enough she would disappear. She was a witch after all, and no, she had not yet learned disappearing magic yet but surely the power of her shame and embarrassment were capable of overcoming such minor considerations as actual knowledge. Eleven years of excellent behavior, of following the rules, of (almost) always doing as she was told, all down the drain. She, Mildred, and Enid were going to be expelled, she just knew it, and she would never be able to either explain to her parents why or look them in the face again.

“I think the more pertinent question is what are you three doing here?”

“Well, you see Miss Cackle we…”

Maud heard the over-bright tone in Mildred’s voice and recognized it as her “I’m about to tell a real whopper” voice and groaned.

“Yes, Mildred?”

“We…”

“What Mildred means to say, Miss Cackle, is that we were about to–” Enid stopped abruptly.

“Miss Cackle, is everything alright? Good heavens, is that young Maud? Maud dear, are you feeling well?”

“Mrrrmmmphhh” Maud whimpered into the cushion. 

“Miss Bat,” Miss Cackle said politely.

“Maud dear, are you hurt? Can you get up, do you think?”

With a great effort, Maud sighed and scrambled up into a standing position. She brushed some hair out of her face and readjusted the glasses on her nose.

“Well met, Miss Bat, Miss Cackle,” she said in a small voice, her hand going to her forehead. “I may never recover from the mortification, but I am otherwise quite well, thank you.”

She looked down, which was surely a mistake for that brought into her view Miss Bat’s slippers, which were enormously fluffy, mostly white, with a small, fuzzy evergreen tree sticking straight up from each.

“Do you like them?” Miss Bat brightened, following her gaze. “Mr. Rowan-Webb bought them for me.”

“They’re very…festive,” Maud replied weakly. She wondered briefly if this is all some sort of bizarre nightmare brought on by too much revision. That might explain why Miss Hardbroom has yet to appear on the scene. Surely no one could sleep through the amount of noise they have all been making.

“Where is Miss Hardbroom?” she asked suddenly.

Miss Bat and Miss Cackle exchanged a speaking glance.

“In bed, asleep, I presume,” Miss Cackle replied.

“Then why haven’t we woken her?” Maud continued, while part of her brain demanded to know why she was intent on making things worse than they already were.

“I cast a silencing spell on her room,” Miss Cackle answered, easily. “That is not, however the question here. I still have not heard a satisfactory answer as to why the three of you broke into her sitting room in the small hours. Or,” she frowned, “why you are carrying a package wrapped in—are those witches with Santa Claus hats?”

“Yes, and I made it,” Mildred announced proudly. “Mum and I have made our Christmas paper my whole life. That I can remember, that is. All you need is brown wrapping paper, stamps and inkpads. And Mum taught me how to make my own stamps when I was nine. And we just learned how to make different colored inks in potions class last week.”

“I figured out how to make the ink glow-in-the-dark,” Enid added. “We tried to add color-changing glitter too, but that…didn’t work out so well.”

“How splendid!” Miss Bat cried. “What creative students we have.”

“Perhaps this is a conversation better continued in the dining hall.” Miss Cackle snapped her fingers and transferred all five of them.

“Do take a seat.” She summoned a tea tray and lifted the pot. “Hot chocolate?”

“Yes please,” Enid responded enthusiastically.

Miss Cackle poured them each a cup.

“Are we not in trouble then?” Enid asked hopefully.

“That remains to be seen.” Ada pushed a cup of cocoa over towards Miss Bat, who had drawn up a comfortable armchair for herself next to the table. A small part of Maud’s brain wondered idly where the chair had come from.

Maud slumped down in her own chair, cradling her cup of cocoa. It was then that she noticed the pulsing colors emanating from the region of the floor. She set the cocoa down and cautiously stuck her head under the table.

Though Maud was quite sure the trees on Miss Bat’s slippers had been bare of any decoration before, they were now decorated with tiny, colorful lights.

“Maud, is everything alright?” Miss Cackle asked.

“Yes, Miss Cackle,” Maud replied, narrowly missing the edge of the table as she returned to a sitting position.

“Now girls,” Miss Cackle began. “I know that it is the last night of the term and that you are no doubt excited about the holidays and being done with exams and going home, but you should know better than to break into the private rooms of your teachers.”

“I wouldn’t call it breaking into, precisely,” Enid hedged.

“And what would you call it, Enid?”

“We were there to do something good. And the door was unlocked.”

“It was?”

Millie raised her hand cautiously.

“Mildred,” Miss Cackle sighed, half-exasperation, half-something-else, which might have been a hint of amusement, “we are not in class, you do not need to wait to be called on.”

“It was unlocked,” she corroborated. “And we were there because I made a present for Miss Hardbroom.”

“All I want is yoouuuuu,” sang Miss Bat’s slippers, in slightly tinny but vaguely familiar voice.

“Oh dear, there really is no rhyme or reason to it is there,” Miss Bat asked to the room at large. She muttered something under her breath and the music ceased. “Mr. Rowan-Webb is a dear but something went wrong when he charmed these slippers, and you never can tell when they’ll start up.” 

“Is that—did Mr. Rowan-Webb record himself singing that?” Maud asked, fascinated.

“Yes, he did! Only it came out a little higher pitched somehow once he’d bound the recording to the trees. And occasionally it comes out in French instead, which is especially odd because he only recorded himself in English.”

“My mum’s really good at recording spells,” Enid piped up. “I bet she could help. This one time, she my dad recorded an entire show for my gran and spelled it to come out of a miniature of them on stage.”

“Why thank you, Miss Nightshade, that’s very thoughtful of you.”

“Mildred,” Miss Cackle began, in a valiant attempt back to its original purpose, “it is very kind of you to make a present for Miss Hardbroom but that does not explain what all of you were doing in her rooms.”

“We were trying to deliver her present.”

“I see. And you did not simply give her the present at a reasonable hour of the day because…?”

“It’s more fun if it is a surprise, everyone knows that.”

Ada pinched the bridge of her nose. “You might have left it in the potions classroom, in that case.”

Mildred shook her head. “I uh, didn’t want anyone to see. They might think I was sucking up, or someone might do something horrible to it to play a prank on me.”

“I would hope our girls are better than that.”

Mildred, Maud, and Enid exchanged a look.

“And you needed your friends to help you with this?” Miss Cackle continued.

“Moral support,” Enid said promptly.

“I see.” Miss Cackle sighed. “Girls, it is laudable to support your friends, and kind of you to make a present for Miss Hardbroom, but we are obviously going to need to have a conversation about the respecting boundaries. Not now, as it is late and we should all be in bed, but tomorrow, before you return to your homes. If you give me the present I will see to it that Miss Hardbroom receives it.”

“After we leave?” Mildred asked anxiously.

“If you like.” Miss Cackle took the lumpy present. “Mildred, your heart is in the right place, but sometimes you need to think things through a little more.”

“Yes, Miss Cackle.”

There was a snuffling noise from the chair. They looked over to see Miss Bat, fast asleep.

“Give me the present and run along to your beds. No side trips, mind,” Miss Cackle added.

The girls complied and scampered off.

“Gwen, dear,” Ada touched her shoulder, “time to go back to bed.”

“What’s that? I’m awake.”

“Bed, Gwen. It’s time to go back.”

“Oh. Good idea. Where are the girls?”

“They’ve gone to bed already. I hope.” Ada performed a quick locator spell. “Yes. As should we.”

Gwen stood up with a wince, and vanished the armchair. She looked at Ada thoughtfully.

“What is it?” Ada asked.

Gwen shook her head. “I’ve changed my mind. Whatever I might have to say on the subject of keeping a relationship secret I am sure you and Hecate have already considered.”

“Over and over again,” Ada agreed. “She knows that it cannot remain a secret from the students forever. They’ll stumble across the truth at some point.”

“She would not rather have more control over that particular revelation?”

“Of course she would, but she’s not ready for that step, and she is willing to accept the level of risk and possible lack of control that comes with that decision. I suspect, though she has not said to me in so many words, that seeing how the children have reacted to you and Algernon has quieted her fears a little.”

“And you, my dear?”

“I am content to wait until she is ready. I have fewer qualms than she.”

Gwen nodded, satisfied. “Good night then, Ada.”

“Good night, Gwen. Pleasant dreams.”

Ada transferred back to her own rooms, placing Mildred’s package in her wardrobe, laid her dressing robe on the chair and quietly slipped back into bed.

“Ada?” Hecate murmured sleepily.

“Just a few students wandering about after hours,” Ada replied. “Gwen and I took care of it.”

“Of course there were. Do you need me to–” she yawned.

“No dear, everything’s settled for now. I’ll tell you more about it in the morning.”

Hecate cracked an eye open. “Mildred Hubble?” she asked, curling towards Ada.

“Yes,” Ada laughed, “it was.”

“It’s always Mildred Hubble,” Hecate murmured.

“She’s a good girl at heart,” Ada replied, brushing her lips against Hecate’s temple.

Hecate wrapped an arm around Ada and pulled her closer, nuzzling her hair. “Yes, she is. Even if she does get into the most impossible scrapes of any student of mine in the past ten years.”

“Surely you exaggerate.”

“I do not. But I trust that whatever you and Gwen have done has headed off the situation at least until a respectable hour of the morning.”

“It has.” 

“Then we’ll speak no more about it.”

“Mmmm.” Ada buried her head in Hecate’s shoulder, and slowly drifted back to sleep.


End file.
